Spring 2025 update
Thanks to the dedication of our passionate staff, strong partnerships with community groups and Traditional Owners, and the generosity of supporters, Prom Sanctuary is already making a difference in conserving nature and fighting extinction at the Prom.
Taking care of our parks by weeding out the pest flora. Credit: Parks Victoria
In August, the park's annual closure created a valuable window for conservation efforts. During this time, teams safely and successfully carried out targeted on-ground programs to manage deer and introduced predators across the park.
The closure also plays a vital role in supporting essential conservation work and park maintenance – helping to protect native wildlife and keep the park in great shape for everyone to enjoy.
Here are some more of our recent highlights:
- Friends of the Prom restoring grasslands: Friends of the Prom volunteers have been busy undertaking grassland restoration following an ecological burn on the Yanakie Isthmus. They have been planting and transplanting grasses and wildflower, along with building cubbies. The cubbies are made using the burst coast tree-trunks (which are abundant onsite) and they provide three benefits:
- protection from grazing animals so that plants can establish,
- a source of the native plants or grass seeds that can be dispersed around the grassland by wind, and
- a cosy refuge for vulnerable animals such as bandicoots, pookila and swamp antechinus to nest and breed in, and also escape predators.
- Mulching of invasive coast tea tree (Gaudium laevigatum) has begun in priority restoration sites across Yanakie Isthmus and Oberon Bay. We've mulched over 42 hectares so far, with many more to go! These mulching works are removing monocultures of tea tree, making space for a wider variety of native plants and animals to return. To support this, we've carried out extensive reseeding of locally extinct or underrepresented species - including billy buttons, grassland daisies, trigger plants, murrnong - helping restore the parks' natural diversity.
- Signs of Healthy Parks: the annual Signs of Healthy Parks monitoring saw 52 wildlife cameras deployed across the park to detect the presence of small mammals. This monitoring has occurred each year for over a decade, and helps us understand which mammal species are present, how they move through different habitats, and how their numbers and locations change over time. This long-term data is key to protecting native animals and making informed decisions about conservation across the park.
- Invasive species control is ramping up over spring: weeding of various species is taking place across the park, with the team tackling infestations of
- mirror bush (Coprosma repens)
- dolichos pea (Dipogon lignosus)
- box thorn (Lycium ferocissimum)
- ragwort (Senecio jacobaea), and
- thistles (Cirsium)
- Invasive animal control programs focusing on deer and foxes are also underway. Visitors can keep an eye out for blue hound's tongue (Cynoglossum creticum), an invasive weed species that was caught early in Wilsons Prom. Learn more about this weed on our website. Visitors can report sightings to the Visitor Centre or contact 131 963.
- Annual spring monitoring of threatened orchid species including eastern spider orchids (Caladenia orientalis), leafy greenhoods (Pterostylis cucullata) and late helmets (Corybas diemenicus) has occurred. Excitingly, the population size and distribution of leafy greenhoods has expanded while populations of the other two species remain stable.
- Planning is underway for more seed collection for the BushBank project: this project aims to establish methodology for restoring collapsed forests, and includes building a Wilsons Prom seedbank for aerial reseeding after bushfires. Seed collection in the upcoming season will prioritise endemic, threatened or fire sensitive wet forest species, such as Gippsland mallee (Eucalyptus kitsoniana) and Tasmanian blue gum (Eucalyptus globulus).
- Cameras to detect lace monitors have been deployed with Gunaikurnai Land and Waters Aboriginal Corporation rangers at various sites across the Prom for the annual spring survey. Platforms with meat-based lures are attached to trees to attract lace monitors to the camera sites. Lace monitors are notoriously sparse at the Prom so this monitoring program is helping us learn more about where they're found and how they move across the landscape. The insights we gain can also guide how we manage introduced predators – helping us better protect native species and support a healthier ecosystem.
- Spot-tail quoll surveys are underway with cameras installed in the area around Sealers Cove. This program is an extension of the spot-tail quoll camera survey run in 2022 where 101 cameras were deployed across the southern section of the Prom. Determining whether this species is present at the Prom will inform either management of the species or how introduced predators are managed in the park.
Friends of the Prom busily undertaking grassland restoration. Credit: Parks Victoria.
Support Prom Sanctuary
Earlier this year, Prom Sanctuary reached a significant milestone. Parks Victoria worked with long-term charity partner, People and Parks Foundation to raise over $800,000 to carry out major habitat restorations as core steps in establishing Victoria's largest conservation sanctuary.
As much as $25 million is needed to realise the full potential of the Prom Sanctuary project. To help support this critically important work through a tax-deductible donation, visit the People and Parks Foundation website.
The People and Parks Foundation is a long-term charity partner of Parks Victoria. It is an Australian charity registered with the Australian Charities and Not-for-profit Commission and is trustee for the People and Parks Environment Trust (Deductible Gift Recipient 1).
About Prom Sanctuary
Prom Sanctuary is a 20-year vision to establish a climate change refuge where vulnerable wildlife and habitats thrive, at Wilsons Promontory National Park, affectionately known as 'the Prom'.
Spanning 50,000 hectares at the southernmost tip of mainland Australia, the Prom is home to more than 150 threatened species of native plants and animals, encompassing 10 major ecosystem types. Valued and cared for over tens of thousands of years by Victoria's Traditional Owners and protected as a national park for more than a hundred years, it has survived the scale of disruption and land clearing that occurred elsewhere around the state and nation.
This unique location, its cultural significance, history, geography and natural beauty make it an ideal refuge for wildlife. As a beloved destination for around half a million Victorian, interstate and international visitors each year, it is also an ideal place to deeply connect people with nature and build support, advocacy, action and champions for nature's needs in challenging times.
Watch the video below to learn more about Prom Sanctuary.
